Natalie Pugh obituary

My wife, Natalie Pugh, who has died aged 82, was an avid Guardian reader from the 1950s onwards and a quintessential Guardian woman.

Born Natalie Gorovitz in London to Russian immigrants, she was a proud Jew and Zionist. She went to John Howard grammar school in Clapton. After graduating in sociology from LSE, she trained in careers guidance. This inaugurated a lifelong concern that everybody should be employed in activities that motivate and develop them.

We married in 1954 and Natalie applied to be a youth employment officer in Edinburgh. Although by far the best qualified candidate, as a married woman she could not be offered a permanent post with a monthly salary, but had to be appointed as a temporary worker with a lower weekly wage. She resented the unfairness and it laid the foundation for her feminism.

Our first child was born in hospital in 1956 at a time when baby and mother were often separated. We had two more children, both at home, prompting Natalie to write a letter to the Guardian about the meagre home confinement grant given to mothers at that time. As Natalie pointed out, it represented a fraction of the cost to the NHS of keeping a mother and baby in hospital for up to 10 days, which was then typical, and was not a very effective incentive to home births.

It was also in the Guardian that she read about pre-school playgroups. None existed in 1960s Birmingham where we lived, and Natalie set up the first in the area. After a career break, Natalie began lecturing part-time in industrial sociology at Hall Green Technical College and the Birmingham College of Food and Domestic Arts.

When we moved to London in 1968, she lectured part-time at North Western Polytechnic, then became a full-time senior lecturer at the Polytechnic of North London (now London Metropolitan University). Her work epitomised what the technical college sector was set up to do – offer opportunities for further and higher education to those not on a university track. She was an enthusiastic advocate and practitioner of access courses, inspiring many students.

She keenly encouraged junior colleagues, gently persuading several unwilling research assistants to undertake their first lecture. She applied this supportive approach to her children and grandchildren, in whom she delighted and for whom she was interested, caring and wise.

Natalie had a number of medical challenges, but never succumbed to self-pity. Although registered blind, with her residual sight she remained an enthusiastic quick crossword solver.

She is survived by me; our children, Helena and Jonathan; and five grandchildren. Our daughter Rosalind predeceased her.